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Sunday, 31 January 2016

Ambassador of Japan HE Matumoto, Ambassador of the European Union, HE Giogkarakis-Argyropoulos, Governor of Jiwaka Dr. Tangamp, Colonel Wrakonei (Commanding Officer Joint Services Academy), Invited Guests, Representatives of so many business houses, Chancellor Sir Nagora Bogan, Council Members (Judd, Wissink, Worthington, McClay, and Bidang), Students, Professors, Faculty, Staff, all friends and partners of UNITECH,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Overview of 2015

First of all, on behalf of UNITECH's management team we like to welcome you all to this second Vice Chancellor's dinner, which we hold before the opening of the academic year. My wife Paulina (also representing Buk Bilong Pikinini) and I would also like to take this opportunity to wish you all a very healthy, happy and productive new year, and wish you all the best in 2016.

Treekangaroo

I thank you all for your support last year, with special thanks to our Chancellor Sir Nagora Bogan, the private sector – our graduate's employer as well as our university's essential suppliers – and our many foreign partners, represented here by Ambassador of Japan and the European Union.

Wednesday, 27 January 2016

Speech held by Dr. Albert Schram, Vice Chancellor, at the opening of the academic year on Monday 1 February 2016, Duncanson Hall, West Taraka Campus.

Twitter: @albertschram

Clouds or Blue Sky?

Is the sky blue, or clouded in 2016?

Ambassador of Japan HE Matumoto, Ambassador of the European Union, HE Giogkarakis-Argyropoulos, Governor Hon. Dr. William Tongamp, Honoured Guests, Students, Faculty, Staff ladies and gentlemen,Welcome to UNITECH, where tomorrow's leaders are forged. Hereby, I declare the Academic Year 2016 officially opened.

Let me start by thanking the Orientation Week committee for putting together a wonderful program, and the Estates and Services Dept and Central Teaching Facilities for showing off today all our facilities in the best possible light.

More than 60% of our students are the first in the family to go to University, and over 20% are the first in their communities. Many of you, therefore, do not know what a university is exactly and how it operates. Today, in this speech I want to provide all students some guidance.

The UNITECH saga between 2012-2014, is one of the few cases in which a PNG government had to concede completely to the demands of a civil society, in this case the student movement. An insightful article about the student movement was published in Times Higher Education, in the middle of the crisis. A number of important lessons can be learned from the student movement on how to influence public policy through peaceful and democratic activism.

Regrettably, not everybody has learned these lessons, and today some are still trying to make life difficult for the UNITECH students and its new leadership team. In 2014, for example, some of these same people managed surreptitiously, without consultation to abolish the autonomy of University Councils in the new Higher Education Act. Unsurprisingly, recently some of these university councils appealed to the government to have the offending article 109 repealed. No answer is expected any time soon. A more recent challenge is the withdrawal of HECAS scholarship money for the students. We met with the Minister of higher education to ask him to fund the scholarships. Promises were made, but no answer was received.

Friday, 8 January 2016

- DRAFT DO NOT QUOTE -

Dr. Albert Schram

Papua New Guinea University of Technology

Introduction

Universities are complex organizations with a triple mission: teaching, research and outreach (or the third mission). Their operations dimension can have a considerable environmental impact depending on the number of students and staff, whether they manage residential campuses or not. Their economic impact regionally or even nationally can be substantial, in terms of generation of employment and their need to utilize a wide range of suppliers. In this article, we try to shed light on the question whether for universities better environmental performance is an optional element of their strategy, or is it linked to overall performance?

About Me

Committed to making a real difference by leading positive change in higher education.

For over 10 years
from 1993-2004, I worked in Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean
in the field of environmental and sustainable development policy, and
environmental economics. My research interest is the role of technology and private business in the development of countries.

As an academic I have 17 peer review publications in various humanities and social sciences disciplines, supervised 5 PhD students and 18 Masters thesis.

As a consultant I worked as head of the environmental
studies department of SIDE, S.A. a consultancy company with
office in Mexico City, San José, and Lima I worked closely together
with many government organizations and private companies. For the World Bank’s Economic Development Institute I carried out two regional studies on sustainable development policies. For the European Commission I wrote one report on corporate social responsiblity, and one on the green economy for the European External Action Service.

Currently, I am Vice-Chancellor or Chief Executive Officer of the Papua New Guinea University of Papua New Guinea, in Lae.